Problem with DNA Transfer

[Pat S]

Has Anyone Else Had Problems with FTDNA's Interpretation of DNA Transferred from Genographic 2.O?
I had my parents both tested with the FTDNA Family Finder program. I took the Ancestry DNA test and the Genographic 2.0 test and then had my Genographic results transferred to FTDNA. My latest FTDNA map and population finder results are completely out of sync with both my earlier tests and those of my parents. When I contacted FTDNA in detail about this they replied with a form letter telling me that inheritance is not always 50-50,,,blaugh,,,,bluagh,,,blaugh and my parents probably didn't pass on portions of their DNA to me.
My problem is that apparently I didn't pass on large chunks of my DNA to myself!
ME ON ANCESTRY:
45% Scandinavian; 15% Central European; 14% British Isles; 12% Southern European; 11% Persian/Turkish/Cucasus; 3% Uncertain
ME ON GENOGRAPHIC 2.0: Ref.
43% Mediterranean
38% Northern European
18% South West Asian
Reference Populations: Danish and Greek
ME ON FTDNA (transferred DNA)
100% European (basically France, Germany)
Reference Population: French.
Although Ancestry and Genographic 2.0 and FTDNA all use somewhat different geographic groupings, basically my first two tests --and also that of my parents who were tested by FTDNA-- all make sense when taken together. My last result-the transferred data from Geno2.0 to FTDNA-- does not.
My question is the advisability of doing a transfer when I could have just as easily ordered a new FTDNA test for the same price? It seems to me that either my DNA was degraded before or during the transfer process, or there is a real problem with interpreting transfer results. I am still waiting to see if FTDNA intends to respond to this concern. Pat S

[Snickering_Homin]

The only Genographic data that really transfers are your y dna snp's. No autosomal dna which would be your ethnic ancestry, transfers from Geno.

If you have autosomal results from Ancestry.com that is what you want to transfer. (To family finder) I think the charge is $69?

[MMaddi]

If you have autosomal results from Ancestry.com that is what you want to transfer. (To family finder) I think the charge is $69?

I don't see the use of spending $69 to transfer Ancestry.com results into an FTDNA account that already has Family Finder results. The person already has matching and Population Finder results through Family Finder in FTDNA's database. The person already knows what ethnic/geographic admixture Ancestry.com has given them. In this situation, transferring Ancestry.com results would just be a waste of money.

The transfer option from Ancestry.com and 23andMe only makes sense for an FTDNA customer who hasn't already ordered Family Finder. That would get them into FTDNA's Family Finder database for $69, instead of paying $99 to order Family Finder.

[MMaddi]

Has Anyone Else Had Problems with FTDNA's Interpretation of DNA Transferred from Genographic 2.O?
I had my parents both tested with the FTDNA Family Finder program. I took the Ancestry DNA test and the Genographic 2.0 test and then had my Genographic results transferred to FTDNA. My latest FTDNA map and population finder results are completely out of sync with both my earlier tests and those of my parents. When I contacted FTDNA in detail about this they replied with a form letter telling me that inheritance is not always 50-50,,,blaugh,,,,bluagh,,,blaugh and my parents probably didn't pass on portions of their DNA to me.
My problem is that apparently I didn't pass on large chunks of my DNA to myself!
ME ON ANCESTRY:
45% Scandinavian; 15% Central European; 14% British Isles; 12% Southern European; 11% Persian/Turkish/Cucasus; 3% Uncertain
ME ON GENOGRAPHIC 2.0: Ref.
43% Mediterranean
38% Northern European
18% South West Asian
Reference Populations: Danish and Greek
ME ON FTDNA (transferred DNA)
100% European (basically France, Germany)
Reference Population: French.
Although Ancestry and Genographic 2.0 and FTDNA all use somewhat different geographic groupings, basically my first two tests --and also that of my parents who were tested by FTDNA-- all make sense when taken together. My last result-the transferred data from Geno2.0 to FTDNA-- does not.
My question is the advisability of doing a transfer when I could have just as easily ordered a new FTDNA test for the same price? It seems to me that either my DNA was degraded before or during the transfer process, or there is a real problem with interpreting transfer results. I am still waiting to see if FTDNA intends to respond to this concern. Pat S

The Population Finder results you got from FTDNA reflect your ethnic/geographic admixture up to 2,000 years ago - see http://www.familytreedna.com/faq/ans...spx?id=22#1166

The Geno 2.0 admixture results reflect your ancestry going back thousands of years. This is stated on the "Who Am I?" page of your Geno 2.0 account: "Your percentages reflect both recent influences and ancient genetic patterns in your DNA due to migrations as groups from different regions mixed over thousands of years."

I don't know how many generations back Ancestry.com's admixture results reflect.

The reason the Geno 2.0 admixture results don't make much sense to you when compared to Population Finder and Ancestry.com is that Geno 2.0 is reporting much more ancient admixture that you're not aware of. It's basically telling you that, as someone with European ancestry, you have ancient admixture from northern Europe, the Mediterranean area (including the Near East) and Southwest Asia (the area from Iran and the Caucasus through India/Pakistan). All these areas have contributed to the genetic make-up of modern Europeans.

As Snickering_Homin alluded to, the most important part of the Geno 2.0 test is the yDNA SNP results. The mtDNA haplogroup from Geno 2.0 isn't a complete test like the full mtDNA sequence you can order from FTDNA. And, as you've noted, the admixture analysis isn't that informative for someone who's interested in relatively recent ancestry.

[Pat S]

Re: Replies to my original post

Number 1--I paid $99 to have my results transferred from Genographic 2.0 to FTDNA's Family Finder. I could have purchased a completely new Family Finder test from FTDNA for $99.
Number2: My AncestryDNA and my Genographic 2.0 match up fine. The FTDNA tests that my parents took also match up well with my own Ancestry and my 2.0 test. It is ONLY my transferred--should I say reprocessed?-- DNA from 2.0 (--which was done for 2.0 by FTDNA in the first place--) to FTDNA which has produced very different results.
So the question remains:
Has any one else had their DNA re analysed by FTDNA for FTDNA's Family Finder program and had strikingly different outcomes between the two tests?
The issue matters to me because I gift these tests to family members all the time. Currently, I would not recommend that anyone pay to have data transferred to be reanalyzed by FTDNA.

[Snickering_Homin]

Number 1--I paid $99 to have my results transferred from Genographic 2.0 to FTDNA's Family Finder. I could have purchased a completely new Family Finder test from FTDNA for $99.
Number2: My AncestryDNA and my Genographic 2.0 match up fine. The FTDNA tests that my parents took also match up well with my own Ancestry and my 2.0 test. It is ONLY my transferred--should I say reprocessed?-- DNA from 2.0 (--which was done for 2.0 by FTDNA in the first place--) to FTDNA which has produced very different results.
So the question remains:
Has any one else had their DNA re analysed by FTDNA for FTDNA's Family Finder program and had strikingly different outcomes between the two tests?
The issue matters to me because I gift these tests to family members all the time. Currently, I would not recommend that anyone pay to have data transferred to be reanalyzed by FTDNA.

I didn't think that was possible?

[MMaddi]

I didn't think that was possible?

You're right. There is no charge to transfer Genographic Project results to an FTDNA account. There never was for Geno 1.0 and there's none now for Geno 2.0.

If the person who transferred wishes further testing with FTDNA, such as the Family Finder test, there will be a charge - $99 in the case of Family Finder. But that's totally the choice of the person. The person can also join various projects, but that's free.

Maybe the poster meant that he/she transferred Ancestry.com raw data to FTDNA. The current price to transfer autosomal raw data from Ancestry. com or 23andMe to FTDNA is $69, but it may have been $99 before.

[MMaddi]

Number2: My AncestryDNA and my Genographic 2.0 match up fine. The FTDNA tests that my parents took also match up well with my own Ancestry and my 2.0 test. It is ONLY my transferred--should I say reprocessed?-- DNA from 2.0 (--which was done for 2.0 by FTDNA in the first place--) to FTDNA which has produced very different results.
So the question remains:
Has any one else had their DNA re analysed by FTDNA for FTDNA's Family Finder program and had strikingly different outcomes between the two tests?
The issue matters to me because I gift these tests to family members all the time. Currently, I would not recommend that anyone pay to have data transferred to be reanalyzed by FTDNA.

There's are problems with the Population Finder (PF) results, which are part of the Family Finder test. You can find numerous threads on this forum where people are unhappy with their PF results or have serious questions about the results.

FTDNA still has PF in its beta stage. They've been promising to get it out of beta and improve its performance, but it hasn't happened yet.

The Family Finder test is an autosomal test that was developed to find cousins in the database. My understanding is that it does a good job of that. PF was added later as an extra feature which didn't increase the cost of the test.

Obviously, if you're more interested in the PF portion of the test and not finding cousins in the database, then Family Finder is not what you're looking for. Perhaps when they add more reference populations and adjust their PF algorithms, Family Finder would perform better for what you want. I'm hoping that when they improve PF, it will not give excessively high Middle Eastern and Middle Eastern (Jewish) percentages to members of the Sicily Project, of which I'm the administrator. You can read many posts I've done on this forum about this problem.

[Pat S]

Thank You

Thanks for your reply. I've corresponded with other people who were unhappy with their population maps on FTDNA; however, none of them had tested with other companies. My nephew who tested recently on FTDNA ended up with only his Western European(mod. Britain) and Middle Eastern ancestry and according to FTDNA had apparently had not received any genes from his parents' European ancestry. My main issue had to do with whether or not getting my DNA reanalyzed by FTDNA (originally submitted for the 2.0 project) was responsible for the unexpected FTDNA results? When I had my parents tested by FTDNA many years back their maps were quite extensive--as was my AncestryDNA map and (of course) my 2.0 map. Then, on FTDNA, I end up with only French and German European ancestry? It seems a bit odd and also at odds with many of my DNA matches on FTDNA and AncestryDNA.
However, I appear to have a healthy portion of Viking ancestry and much more recent French ancestry and realistically, those folks were also had a genetic presence in Gt Britain, and Germany. So, I'm just going to take my FTDNA map as representative of all of Europe and leave it at that. I would like to know what happened to my Middle Eastern/Caucasus genes though!
Thanks again. Your reply was helpful.
Pat

[MMaddi]

My main issue had to do with whether or not getting my DNA reanalyzed by FTDNA (originally submitted for the 2.0 project) was responsible for the unexpected FTDNA results?

The answer to your main question above is "no."

By uploading your Geno 2.0 results to FTDNA, you gave them access to your DNA sample for further testing, if you wished. From what you wrote above you paid $99 to order the Family Finder test, once you had established an FTDNA account.

The Geno 2.0 test uses a testing chip with about 160,000 SNPs. The Family Finder test uses a different testing chip with about 700,000 SNPs. There's a small overlap between the SNPs tested on the two chips, but these two tests are looking for different things in different timescales. Family Finder is more oriented to a genealogical time frame of the last several hundred years, while Geno 2.0 is oriented to an anthropological time frame of thousands of years.

So, your Family Finder results, including PF, was an entirely different analysis of your DNA. They were not just reinterpreting your Geno 2.0 results.

As I mentioned above, Family Finder also will give you matches with estimated cousins in the database; that's the main purpose of the test. So, I suggest that you haven't entirely wasted $99. Take a look at your matches, which may be useful to any genealogy research you're doing.

[tomcat]

For those displeased with PF, or desirous of a second opinion, there are other admixture analyses available free of charge or a modest fee.

The free options are Gedmatch and Doug McDonald and the retail option is DNATribes.